If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Don't all the male ones do that pose and all the females do the other one?

Malva is a boss. I wish we knew more about her motivation and her backstory, and I also think that it is really interesting that one of the strongest trainers is "evil". Normally GF is all like "Strong people are good and evil ones are weak" but Malva, being a part of an evil organization, is still a serious trainer and part of the E4. Also, does the rest of the E4 and Diantha not know or do they just not care? I feel like there would be background checks before you get into one of the biggest organizations in the Pokemon world.

Don't all the male ones do that pose and all the females do the other one?

Malva is a boss. I wish we knew more about her motivation and her backstory, and I also think that it is really interesting that one of the strongest trainers is "evil". Normally GF is all like "Strong people are good and evil ones are weak" but Malva, being a part of an evil organization, is still a serious trainer and part of the E4. Also, does the rest of the E4 and Diantha not know or do they just not care? I feel like there would be background checks before you get into one of the biggest organizations in the Pokemon world.

We've had a similar situation with Giovanni, so they probably just don't care...

Yeah, I feel like in Pokémon world, what matters more are your skills as a trainer and not your reputation/outside occupation.

On the one hand, that's kind of respectful to be able to keep a position without what you do in your personal time messing things up (unlike how it is in the real world). But on the other hand, we could see a future E4 member who massacred a bunch of people in a future generation! [/Half kidding]

Valid points, but I was expecting that after it was revealed that Malva was part of Team Flare, she would no longer be a part of the E4. I hope she is the Champion in the next installment.
However, it is a good thing that pokemon trainers are based on prowess, not morals. I wonder how they will deal with her in the anime... *leaves to go to anime forum*

Though that brings up the question of how Lysandre will be handled, especially his fate and how Ash and co will react. They've already watched Cyrus, Marcus*, potentially Mirage Master if you consider that canon, and J** presumably die and had no reaction, and it's getting really weird. If they can walk away from Lys essentially killing himself in front of them and still have no reaction, then I'll have to seriously question their mindsets

*yes I know Marcus survived but they don't know that. Any of them might have survived and Ash and co wouldn't know.
**Ash wasn't present for J's explosion but Gary was.

The world's greatest collector as drawn by Yoru Ryu
Fancy Jirarudan too? Then you'll enjoy my fic Obsession! (Chapter 31 posted on August 21st, 2017!)
It's got its own TV Tropes page!
Check out some of my other fics!Answering Machine, winner of Most Heartbreaking Scene 2013!Heart Like A Stone, winner of Most Heartbreaking Fic and 3rd place Best Canon Character-Centric 2014!Solar System, 4th place, Villainous Intent

Ok, a quick question. My apologies, I haven't quite read through all 90 pages of the thread, so I'm not sure if it has been addressed at all... In any case, I haven't been able to find anything that quite answers the question in all the other places I've looked.

In regards to the Gate between Laverre City and Rt. 15, before you tackle the Pokeball Factory, there is a Team Flare (grunt?) that says (paraphrased) "If you pay me P-Ľ 5mil, you can join Team Flare"

Q: Since the money limit in this game is P-Ľ 9,999,999, what exactly happens if you do have P-Ľ 5mil?

I can't seem to find any place that actually addresses this, especially since, on most of the [Place] listings for walkthroughs and wikis don't seem to count the Gates as actually existing, it seems.

The Team Flare theme makes me want to rip my hair out. I don't DESPISE it, per say, but there's something about it that just really, really grinds my gears. It just sounds so bad... but so good... but it's not even good...

Aside from that, the male Team Flare grunt pose is pretty much the best thing in the game. You know the one.

I couldn't sympathize with Lysandre because the problems he complained about barely exist in the Pokemon world. It's an example of telling, but not showing. We never run into several npcs suffering, see anyone steal because they need to, told there's currently a war over resouces and see many npcs and Pokemon feeling the effects instead everyone we come across has a big smile plastered across their face, living their carefree dreams with their monster BFFs so Lysandre come across as delusional.

That's because pokemon is set in an ideal world in which strangers leave their front doors unlocked, minors are allowed to roam the country with no adult supervision, and kids can hold respected job titles.
It's basically working socialism.

However, I like to think of this as the 4th dimension, if you will, where the game crosses over into our reality.
Absolutely none of these problems have any hold in the pokemon world, and it serves to show how crazy Lysandre is in the games. But, I think that's a pretty good commentary. If these problems exist, or at least cause concern, in a perfect world, what about our very flawed existence?

Except these problems clearly do exist, they're just never shown to us. Lysandre and Sycamore both confirm that terrible things like war and crime do happen in the pokemon world, it's just rarely shown to us. Of course the idea that the pokemon world is a utopian society makes no sense because evil organizations still manage to appear.

To right the countless wrongs of our day, we shine this light of true redemption, that this place may become as paradise. What a wonderful world such would be...

... War was prominently shown throughout XY 3000 years ago and mentioned several times it happens in "afar Regions" by NPCs.

And crime is in literally every Pokémon Game, albeit only by theft.

And poverty (and gambling addiction with the latter) was implied with Maylene and her father in Gen IV, as well.

The thing is just that it's veiled by a layer of sweetness.
It's just like the human mind, we try to hide our flaws and provide a false lull of perfection instead, but only few really seek out to the former and point it towards others, which, in the case of Pokémon, were Lysandre, and to an extent, Cyrus as well.

Except these problems clearly do exist, they're just never shown to us. Lysandre and Sycamore both confirm that terrible things like war and crime do happen in the pokemon world, it's just rarely shown to us. Of course the idea that the pokemon world is a utopian society makes no sense because evil organizations still manage to appear.

That does unfortunately come down to the old adage "Show, don't Tell" though. The thing is we're told that war exists, but aside from a flashback (which takes place in the distant past) we never see it in a present day situation. Similarly, we rarely (if ever) see any of the selfish people or actions Lysandre goes on about outside of the evil organizations. So there's a clash between the idealized world Pokemon wants to give and the image Lysandre wants to push, and unfortunately for the latter, the evils of the world are presented much more in the minority due to the nature of the games.

That does unfortunately come down to the old adage "Show, don't Tell" though. The thing is we're told that war exists, but aside from a flashback (which takes place in the distant past) we never see it in a present day situation. Similarly, we rarely (if ever) see any of the selfish people or actions Lysandre goes on about outside of the evil organizations. So there's a clash between the idealized world Pokemon wants to give and the image Lysandre wants to push, and unfortunately for the latter, the evils of the world are presented much more in the minority due to the nature of the games.

We had six Generations of villainous Teams to show that Lysandre's preachings of crime were correct, at least.

Although I think the reason it is a "Show, don't tell" is because unless Pokémon bleed rainbows or whatever war will be somewhat hard to show without forcing ratings to go up, which is something Core Series Pokémon has heavily avoided.

We had six Generations of villainous Teams to show that Lysandre's preachings of crime were correct, at least.

Although I think the reason it is a "Show, don't tell" is because unless Pokémon bleed rainbows or whatever war will be somewhat hard to show without forcing ratings to go up, which is something Core Series Pokémon has heavily avoided.

To some extent, yes, but again it's only a really specific group of people who are shown to do that (ironically of which, Lysandre's own is one of them), remove them from the equation and you almost have a world made completely of lollipops and rainbows. So it's still a world less grimmer then the world Lysandre wants to paint.

And yeah, the theme clashes with the ideals of the Pokemon world, so it's an element that unfortunately could not be given the attention it wanted to be given.

To some extent, yes, but again it's only a really specific group of people who are shown to do that (ironically of which, Lysandre's own is one of them), remove them from the equation and you almost have a world made completely of lollipops and rainbows. So it's still a world less grimmer then the world Lysandre wants to paint.

And yeah, the theme clashes with the ideals of the Pokemon world, so it's an element that unfortunately could not be given the attention it wanted to be given.

I agree somewhat, as the Burglar Trainer Class exists and theft in general has been seen, but eh.
Was Lysandre not about having limited resources lead to all the problems he stated, though?

Indeed.
Although I do not wish for any mature themes in Pokémon outside possibly PMD or the such, it does mean it cannot explore the themes it presents fully, which is somewhat disheartening.

Although I think the reason it is a "Show, don't tell" is because unless Pokémon bleed rainbows or whatever war will be somewhat hard to show without forcing ratings to go up, which is something Core Series Pokémon has heavily avoided.

It's not just about the ratings though. I think GF have made a conscious decision to keep war as distant from the player's world as possible due to it being a reality. Some players might have family who are stationed out there and war might be too much for them to handle. Any other crime other than theft is also something they don't want to put effort into showing. I mean could you imagine drugs, rape, murder being tackled in a Pokémon game? They're such ugly and real topics and, more importantly, they have no real purpose in the game. The game is supposed to be fun & light with it's occasional "deep" moments, not gritty and psychologically damaging (to children).

You can bring up the Marowak thing but that's closer to animal cruelty which shows that Pokémon can be killed by a human than straight up "OMG the Professor has just been shot!".

Originally Posted by Taodragon

And yeah, the theme clashes with the ideals of the Pokemon world, so it's an element that unfortunately could not be given the attention it wanted to be given.

And it is for that reason I find this whole storyline ridiculous. It should have not been done, it's a weak social commentary at worst with the best being simply a weak attempt at adding a dimension to the Pokéworld.

Really, Team Flare fell flat because they tried to make Lysandre sympathetic and his cause seem just. The thing is, they didn't build them up to be that way. Team Flare was an organization where you have to pay large sums of money just to be apart of it. Team Flare was based around this idea that only those who are beautiful and committed to the cause should be allowed to survive. It was an elitist group more than anything else. The Team Flare Grunts were all about superficiality and status.

That doesn't line up with Lysandre's ideals. Not even in the complete opposite and hypocritical kind of way. It isn't like Team Plasma where the grunts proved the hypocrisy of groups like that. Team Flare seemed to have completely different goals than Lysandre. What does being status driven and superficial have to do with wanting to kill the world and rebirth it? Other than the really weak link of "beauty is both internal and external" how do the two themes mesh?

That's why I didn't feel anything good or bad for Lysandre's cause. They were trying to make it a story about being superficial and how it's more important to be pretty on the inside, until the end. If they would have just kept with Lysandre being an elitist jerk who literally only wants to see pretty things, the story would have been more consistent. It might not have been the best story, but at least it would have kept a steady flow. The thing is, they decided to suddenly turn it into a psychological question. Lysandre was suddenly asking questions about whether or not it's worth it to keep the ugly in exchange for a perfect and Utopian world. But he never hinted at it. This big theme wasn't brought up until later. Not only that, but they tried to make Lysandre mysterious which made me feel even less about his character and beliefs.

Not only did the story not have a whole lot to do with the plot, but the connections were so loose in between the threads that they were trying to make that there just wasn't an emotional drive for me.

even if we don't understand each other, that's not a reason to reject each other. There are two sides to any argument. Is there one point of view that has all the answers? Give it some thought.

^ This is the reason why I like arguing. If I come off as standoffish or overly angry in an argument, don't worry. I'm probably having the time of my life. Whether I agree with them or not, the pokemon fandom has a lot of different opinions, and I love how nobody is afraid to share them.

While I agree, the plot was literally nonexistent to begin with. Who buys Pokémon for the plot anyways?

Haha, yeah. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely loved X and Y's gameplay and they aren't bad games in the slightest. I just live for storyline analysis, even if it's pretty weak. I love talking about this kind of stuff.

even if we don't understand each other, that's not a reason to reject each other. There are two sides to any argument. Is there one point of view that has all the answers? Give it some thought.

^ This is the reason why I like arguing. If I come off as standoffish or overly angry in an argument, don't worry. I'm probably having the time of my life. Whether I agree with them or not, the pokemon fandom has a lot of different opinions, and I love how nobody is afraid to share them.

While I agree, the plot was literally nonexistent to begin with. Who buys Pokémon for the plot anyways?

Well, it is something you can enjoy out of the games even if it's not something you're primarily looking for in them. Personally, while I do primarily play for the Pokémon and their lore, if the main story's still enjoyable in its own right, then that's another good thing to take away from the game as well.

Also, like with what Plus said, it is fun and interesting to think and talk about those elements with others.

No no no, doll. I'm saying that buying a Pokémon game for its plot is like buying a hamburger for its nutritional value. The Pokémon games have always had a paper-thin plotline. There's not much too dissect; it's as deep as a kiddie pool. Catch my drift?

The game is not Final Fantasy, and that's OK. It doesn't need to be. I was just amused someone mentioned the plot at all.

(Sidenote: The rich lore adds to the experience but it's greatly spoon fed to us anyways.)

Lysandre was suddenly asking questions about whether or not it's worth it to keep the ugly in exchange for a perfect and Utopian world. But he never hinted at it. This big theme wasn't brought up until later

"Suddenly"? "Not brought up until later"? Then what was this stuff about:

During your first encounter: "My desire... it is for a more beautiful world!"

During your second encounter: "Wouldn't you rather remain young and beautiful forever and always play such roles?" "You were chosen to be a movie star, correct? Isn't it your duty to be ever beautiful? Everything beautiful should stay that way forever. [In X: I would make this world unchanging and eternal so all beauty will last forever.] [In Y: I would end the world in an instant so that beauty never fades.] I can't stand the thought of the world becoming uglier."

During your third encounter: "Kalos is beautiful right now! There will be no foolish actions if the number of people and Pokémon do not increase. That being said, the future isn't decided. You can't be sure each day will be like the one before." "What the king of Kalos did was reprehensible, but... The ultimate weapon did manage to wash the world clean of that era's filth."

The next time you get a message from him, it's a brief dialogue about Mega Evolution, and after that, he's gone nutso.

Originally Posted by Plus side down side

Not only that, but they tried to make Lysandre mysterious which made me feel even less about his character and beliefs.

He was a little mysterious, sure, but I got the sense that they were trying to make him the most outwardly approachable crime boss thus far, hence him being a polite businessman and a fellow pupil of Sycamore, who was open to discussions and actively contacted you to congratulate you at times.

Last edited by Endolise; 1st April 2014 at 2:57 AM.

Originally Posted by Lord Zoroark

Listen, you gotta remember these things; always avoid claims of Fennekin being (or becoming) part Fighting-type, don't tick off mods, and NEVER (and I mean NEVER!) suggest that Arceus is the God of Pokemon when Endolise is online. If you somehow make this mistake, run for the hills before he attempts to murder you via tongue lashing.

No no no, doll. I'm saying that buying a Pokémon game for its plot is like buying a hamburger for its nutritional value. The Pokémon games have always had a paper-thin plotline. There's not much too dissect; it's as deep as a kiddie pool. Catch my drift?

The game is not Final Fantasy, and that's OK. It doesn't need to be. I was just amused someone mentioned the plot at all.

(Sidenote: The rich lore adds to the experience but it's greatly spoon fed to us anyways.)

Doll? I'm not a Banette!

I don't think anyone's saying that they are buying it just for the plot (then again, few games are like that) nor do I think they are saying it has to be to the level of some Final Fantasy games, but it's an element that can be enjoyed for what it is, paper-thin or not. Also, we are technically dissecting it if we are talking about elements that we felt did or didn't work in the plot or are left open, so the elements are there even if there aren't as many.

Regardless, it's just something to talk about, no matter how little or big it is. It may not be much relative to other stories, but they are there for us to say something about them.

The whole thing with the grunts not following Lysandre's ideals was the point. Lysandre equated wealth and youth with his idea of someone who should survived. In the end he got exactly what he didn't want because he never truly knew what made a great person. They're supposed to clash. It also didn't help Team Flare were stating to people that only they would survive. It attracted people who only wanted to save themselves.

While I'm at it, i'm pretty baffled that people seem to think this game lacks plot, world-building, and theming when compared to the gen 4 and 5 games. It's all there if you look. It's true the plot is less than BW's, but does anyone seriously think it's less than DPPT's?

Now the real shame and my one big nitpick, is how mega evolution was handled in the story. It kinda just drops importance after you obtain it. Lysandre brings it up once and he makes a good point ("Do all people and Pokémon have such potential, or is it hidden within a chosen few"). But then it's never mentioned by him in this way again. Then you have Trevor and Sycamore theorizing that maybe all pokemon could Mega Evolve. This could be used as the counter argument Sycamore needed instead him just saying "maybe we are all screwed in the end, oh well!"

To right the countless wrongs of our day, we shine this light of true redemption, that this place may become as paradise. What a wonderful world such would be...